Combatants may be required to use rifles to engage threats at varying ranges. Often, combatants prefer separate rifle sighting systems for threats at varying ranges. For AR-15/M16 style weapons and other types of assault rifles, optical sights generally provide superior performance at longer ranges (beyond 200 meters), but traditional iron sights can be more effective for close-range engagements (inside 200 meters). However, attaching a telescopic optical sight can prevent the use of iron sights. If an optical sight fails at a critical moment, the sight may need to be physically removed from the weapon in order to use the back up sight. Even if the optical sight and the backup iron sights are mounted to the weapon in a co-witnessed alignment, the setup often causes a front sight “shadow” on the optical image. The addition of an optical sight also may present problematic transitions from telescopic optical sights to traditional iron sights.
The weapon sights of the present invention can be used simultaneously in conjunction with another optical sight and can be mounted on the same weapon accessory rail as the other optical sight. The weapon sights of this invention eliminate the cluttered or blocked field of vision of telescopic optical sights. The weapon sights of this invention include a front sight and a rear sight that mount to the weapon's accessory rail, but are cantilevered and off-set so that they do not interfere with the primary optical sight mounted to the same accessory rail. The cantilevered configuration and off-set orientation of the rear sight assembly and the front sight post also allows the shooter to transition quickly between the weapon sight of this invention and an optical sight by simply canting the weapon 45 degrees to bring the desired sight on target and into the vertical of the weapon. Using the off-set sights of this invention in conjunction with a traditional optical sight allows a shooter to engage targets at longer ranges using the primary optical sights, then quickly transition to engage targets at closer ranges using off-set iron sights.
These and other advantages of the present invention will become apparent from the following description of an embodiment of the invention with reference to the accompanying drawings.